Fluid dispensers are known which dispense fluid by the use of dispensing apparatuses using electricity to dispense the fluid as, for example, by operation of an electric pump to pump the fluid from a reservoir, by control and/or metering of the fluid being dispersed and by the use of sensors to sense proximity, for example, of a user's hand to a cleaning fluid dispenser. An example of an electrically powered fuel dispenser with control circuits and proximity sensors are disclosed in the applicant's U.S. Pat. No. 5,836,482 which shows, in particular, a disposable flexible plastic bag to contain liquid hand soap and carrying two conventional batteries which, when the bag is coupled to a dispenser provides power to dispense soap from the bag by means of an electric pump. Electric proximity sensors may control operation of the pump.
Known fluid dispensers, which are battery operated, suffer the disadvantages that separate batteries must be provided. Convention batteries need to be replaced periodically and are difficult to recycle. Disposable fluid reservoirs are known which are made of recyclable plastic materials, however, known batteries are not made of easily recyclable materials and must be separately recycled from the reservoirs.
Fuel cells for the creation of electrical energy by the conversion of alcohol compounds, such as, ethanol are known as are techniques for manufacturing such fuel cells in the mass production manner as on the plastic film.
Direct alcohol fuel cells are taught in U.S. Pat. No. 5,132,193 to Ready, issued Jul. 21, 1992 which teaches generation of electricity in a small compact alcohol fuelled fuel cell electric power plant in which poisoning by reaction intermediates is avoided or minimized. As alcohol fuels, lower primary alcohols are preferred particularly methanol and ethanol with other lower primary alcohols such as 1-propanol, 1-butanol and n-amyl alcohol also operative.
Miniature fuel cells that run on ethanol and adapted to run electronics are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,364,711 to Wamada, issued Nov. 15, 1994 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,432,023 to Wamada, issued Jul. 11, 1995. These patents teach the advantages of using miniature fuel cells and a number of techniques to build fuel cells. U.S. Pat. No. 5,759,712 to Hockaday describes packaging of a fuel cell on a general hybrid system which may be comprised of fuel cell and other energy sources, such as a battery.
Miniature liquid fuel cells are known as discussed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,326,097 to Hockaday, issued Dec. 4, 2001. Hockaday is directed to the coupling of such fuel cells to portable electric devices, such as, cell phones. Hockaday teaches micro fuel cell arrays which may be mass-produced on a plastic film in a reel-to-reel process.
Electrochemical cells are known which are relatively inexpensive. Closed electrochemical cells suffer a disadvantage that typically gases which may be produced at one of the electrodes reduce the life of the cell and/or excessive accumulation of the gases are not provided or come to render the cell unusable. Open cell electrochemical batteries and fuel cells are known, however, they suffered the disadvantage that they consume fuel and fuel must be replaced.